Posted
by
Soulskill
on Tuesday August 23, 2011 @10:13AM
from the great-expectations dept.

Over 11 years ago, Deus Ex became one of the most celebrated games of its time, tightly weaving FPS and RPG gameplay together with a rich cyberpunk story. Today, Eidos Montreal and Square Enix launched a new entry to the series, titled Deus Ex: Human Revolution. A launch trailer is available, and early reviews for the game are positive. Opposable Thumbs says, "Fans can take a deep breath: they will get what they want from a Deus Ex game in this release. The story is dense, complete with twists, interesting characters, and far-flung locations." Rock, Paper, Shotgun largely agrees, and both reviews praise the breadth of choices players have in how they accomplish mission objectives. However, they disagree on the quality of the voice acting, and RPS complains of untimely and oddly-designed boss battles. DE:HR's stealth gameplay and hacking minigame receive high marks, as does the game's overall length and replayability.

I have no complaints, and it does indeed feel like Deus Ex. Stable engine too, not a single crash. The only graphical oddity I had was some white "noise-like" pixels in models. I determined this was caused by enabling Tesselation with an nvidia card. Turning it off fixed the issue and as far as I can tell had no actual effect on quality.

I can rattle off on things that I love, but I'm hard pressed to find a single annoyance. Hell, they went so far as to NOT use mouse acceleration! I'm so used to that failure being included in games that I thought something was wrong for a few minutes!

It says something about game makers today when praise for a game comes more from a lack of criticism about it than from saying how good it is. Then again, being a Deus Ex game expectations are so high that a lack of criticism is one of the highest praises.

Based on this Ars review, I ended up pre-ordering it last night on Steam (to get the 10% discount and TF2 items... I love prerdering 5 hours before a game release) and am highly anticipating the end of work so I can play it tonight. I'm glad to see that i

My problem is that I've become so cynical of reviews these days being bought and paid for, that I almost never buy a title on release anymore. How many titles have GREAT! INCREDIBLE! AMAZING! reviews on the week of their release, only for it to come out later on user forums and follow-up reviews that they have deep flaws? When most videogame websites/magazines these days are about 75% gushing "previews," with only a handful of actual *reviews*, I find it hard to trust that any game "journalist" (especially

That's why I pointed out how good Ars Technica was. They have published articles in the past about how they or other news sites have been pressured to release trumped-up reviews for games (generally with the threat of not receiving early review copies in the future.) Duke Nukem Forever, specifically, due to the negative reviews (since it sucked hard) resulted in many reviewers being threatened (in fact, he published a public tweet saying and I quote “Too many went too far with their reviews... we are

Aye. I trust Ars because they don't live purely on game reviews. Gaming-only sites are always circumspect because they need the games to survive. Ars just kinda does it along with everything else, so they can call a spade a spade.

The great irony is that the opposite is true, you are scum. You and those like you are what make dictatorships possible, you are so invested in the idea of pro-corporate power you'll get on their knee's and suck their dicks as you perpetually rent software for eternity buy expensive $15 dollar map packs, buy games who shut down modding and come with no map editor because you are so deficient in IQ and intelligence and never grew up during the PC gaming of the 90's where all of those things were provided, o

I have many complaints, starting with the crashes, moving through the consolesq feel of the game and the heavy compression artifacts in the cinematics and ending with the fact that everyone in the game world seems to have both stubby arms and a turrets syndrome like series of facial and arm ticks. What ever these beings evolved from, it was not humans. Humans have arms that reach past their waste and can interact with one another without their arms spastically jerking around while their head whips back and

I did not crash once, and admittedly such problems are usually all-or-nothing, so I'll give you this one.

The controls seem about as far from a console as you can get. I did need to set my mouse X sensitivity a bit lower than my Y to get a nice circular sensitivity, but this is really a matter of preference.

The cinematics seemed quite crisp to me - no color banding or blocking etc. The only animation issue I noticed was the unnatural way things around someone's neck (eg their collar) would move with their he

Your health regenerates via your cybernetic augmentations, there are no "health packs" and a head shot tends to kill faster then a body shot. However there is no location specific damage tracking (meaning that you cant injure a limb).

Yes, given enough time. It's slow, and the delay between receiving damage and regeneration starts is pretty long.

This is also explained by an augmentation. It's in your augs screen. It's even referenced by a technician while he fixes a minor problem early in the game.

You CAN use painkillers and stuff to bring your health past the normal 100%. Regeneration does NOT recover this. On normal, you also take damage fairly easily. I'd imagine on Hard you'd die pretty damn fast.

As a left-handed-mouser I'm disappointed the engine can't tell the difference between up/down/left/right/insert/delete/pgup/pgdn on the arrow-columns of my keyboard vs. the equivalents on the numpad. So I can't map everything onto those keys for actions as I do in Source games, thus I have to take my hand off the mouse to do certain functions. But I play in the dark, so I don't always hit the correct key when I do that.

But... bosses? In Deus Ex?? Pre-animated takedowns? I don't know, that doesn't sound like the immersive Deus Ex games I enjoyed playing. Contrivances take you out of the game.

As does the "uncanny valley" of photo-quality textures on badly-animated people. A sign of poor animation is that someone cowering is fear looks like their strategy to avoid danger is to stand in one place and pretend to be a bunny rabbit.

I loved the Deux Ex games to bits, I hope this one has more attention to story and gameplay than g

Pre-animated takedowns are an issue? You sneak up on em and hit the button, and you get a nice third-person "mini-cinematic" of you putting him in a chokehold or such. Ragdoll-type stuff takes over past a certain point.

It really is very very similar to Deus Ex. so much so, you might find yourself thinking "Wait, so they haven't actually done anything new or original, they've just completely ripped off the first game". Then you realise how much you're enjoying it and don't want it to end, just like with the first game.Then you realise that 10 years of evolution in games has somehow brought us right back to where we were when the original Deus Ex came out. Truly, a game so far ahead of its time that the only game to match it would be its prequel.

I am perfectly alright with them making it so much similar. The fact is that after DX2 I no longer had the heart to go back and play the original again. But I picked up the original when I saw this coming out and decided I HAD to give it another chance. Im still enjoying the run through of the original! I always wished the assault rifle did more damage though. =\

It has not been long enough, but I am not quite agreeing with the glowing reviews. The story so far is great, and the levels/cities are really well designed. The graphics are good, while nowhere near The Witcher 2 or even Crisis/Metro. The great, internally consistent style of the game world more than makes up for that.

But the combat, oh, the combat. I started both one shooter and one sneaker character, and tried two difficulty levels with each. I have not found a combo that worked satisfyingly. The shooter mode is stupid easy until you crank up the difficulty, and then it becomes a 'pop in and out of cover' chore. (Disclaimer: I despise cover combat)

The sneaking is immensely satisfying, until you clearly screw up, wait for hammer to fall... and the guard brushes against you and walks on without detecting you.

It needs work. It is nowhere as bad as Alpha Protocol, or whatever the spy game was called. It is enjoyable, and I do not regret buying it. I hope it will be polished after release, the way the Witcher 2 still is. But even if it is abandoned, the way AP was, it is still worth playing.

I've experienced this too. The stealth game works right up until you're detected. If that happens you can usually just sprint back a room or two, and not only will the enemies not find you, they usually won't even leave the room they were in to chase you down the hallway they saw you go down.
Also, the boss fights are crap.

. The stealth game works right up until you're detected. If that happens you can usually just sprint back a room or two, and not only will the enemies not find you, they usually won't even leave the room they were in to chase you down the hallway they saw you go down.

That reminds me of when I played through Operation Flashpoint. I was stressed out of my wits most of the time, until in one of the last missions I actually crawled right in front of some enemies in a poorly lit area, and they didn't even notice me..

What don't you like about "cover combat" though? Personally, I hate games where you have to shoot the enemies several times in the head before they even die. I played the original Deus Ex on "realistic", where one or two shots would kill your own character too, s

The problem with the cover based combat in Deus Ex HR is that it's awkward, especially if you're a die hard PC fps fan. Being a grizzled FPS veteran and huge fan of the first game I ignored the tutorial videos that comes up so when I first fired up the game I kept dying because i'd be doing the whole pop up and shoot, spamming the crouch buttton and A and D. You know, cover based shooting like you would in half life. The "proper" way to do cover based combat is to hold down the right click button to stick b

While still a great game I can't help but feel that the multiplatform release is holding it back from being a really great PC game for the ages.

I was hoping someone would expand on this. When the second game came out with "universal ammo", crap level design, and overall short game length, they managed to kill many of the things that made the PC original great. All done presumably to make it more accessible on consoles. My main concern on this one is what kind of tradeoffs, if any, were made in that context.

Cover combat kinda turns into a silly shooting gallery in its modern incarnation, especially since you can just duck behind the cover and wait for your health to refill automatically. It removes most of the map from the actual gameplay and turns all enemies into samey fights as they all just hide and you shoot them when they look out of their hiding place. Also it becomes too samey across games, most cover shooters play very similar to each other to the point where it stops mattering which one you play and

As for headshots, I think the focus on "one bullet to the head is fatal" has made games even more samey, can't even have varying enemy HP since they all die to a single headshot

You can still vary the difficulty level of the opponents with caliber required to make a successful headshot. E.g. in the old Deus Ex, you could headshot common NSF and MJ12 soldiers with a pistol or an assault rifle, but you needed a sniper rifle for MJ12 commandos in power armors (and, IIRC, you needed extra skill points in rifles). And, of course, it didn't work at all against bots.

That, and also make it hard by adding bullet spread. Again, headshotting with a pistol was possible, but you had to get pret

You probably should have played it on realistic. They were just as accurate as you, and could drop you in one or two hits.... and I've noticed that vision on DX3 seems a bit more graduated. I did a cover-to-cover "flip" when the guard was looking just shy of 90 degrees off, and he became suspicious and investigated fairly halfheartedly. The same spot (I got killed and was trying again - so same guard, same locations etc) except he was looking in my direction - he spotted me immediately, called over his fri

I completed Deus Ex on realistic in "pacifist" mode (i.e. non-lethal weapons only, and only kill those NPCs where it is inevitable in the storyline).

GP is right, though. The enemies there were always dumb against a player using stealth to its full extent. You could easily wipe out whole squads by moving from cover to cover, using throwables to distract them and make them look the other way, and tranquilizer darts. So long as you were not in line of sight when the dart hits, they wouldn't find you but just r

You must've never played on "Hard" or "Realistic".
It's fairly tricky to set up an agent with believable vision and believable hearing. Being able to distract guards by throwing a bottle, and having them investigate fallen comrades, was a new level for agent environment awareness for the day.

I "pre-ordered" on Sunday night through amazon.com and paid the $.99 for release date delivery. I got the Augmented edition, it seemed like a good deal for the extra $10. I can't wait to play, the original DX was one of my absolute favorites, it had so many decision points and the game could turn out very differently based on what you chose.

I don't know why it's getting so much praise, because it's a total downer for me. The whole point of Deus ex, particularly when you play stealthy, is that it relies on skill. The skill to know what way to tackle a situation, the skill to avoid patrols and not get caught. However, the hacking comes down to chance, complete and utter chance. You can upgrade your skills all you want, but all this does is lower the chances of you getting caught. It's still entirely down to chance, though.It means that you may as well just save before hacking anything, go for it and if you fail, just reload. No skill required. It utterly takes away from it for me.

The original Deus Ex didn't really do a hacking minigame. As soon as you hacked anything, you were in, but you only had so much time to do what you wanted (more if you upgraded this skill), but at least this still took some skill, it still gave the impression of having to work quickly, to plan ahead what you want to do and practice doing it once you were in. It's such a shame the hacking element in Deus Ex: HR is more of a brute-force thing.

As you start hacking and gaining control of intermediate systems, eventually you "screw up" and the system becomes alerted that something is wrong. You can see the node(s) where the IDS must be. There's a base chance that you'll be detected on each action based on the system "level" - and there are augmentation upgrades you can spend Praxis on that reduce this chance.

Now, the IDS starts reaching out to it's connected systems, "checking" them. The game is up if it reaches an

Well, not directly. But if you happen to be hacking near any turrets or haven't disposed of any guards, the alarm that goes off when you fail will call them over to kill you instead. That part is similar to the classic Deus Ex.

I like the hacking system, leaps over DX, and by far better than in DX:IW. Honestly though? You're standing around hacking in a trenchcoat, you think someone wouldn't notice that? Or would you take that extra step into reality, and neutralize targets nearby and/or block hostile cameras from seeing you?

I got my way inside the police station the "nice" way - I had authorization. I tried to hack someone's door code. I got shot in the face for the trouble (a cop walked past the hallway (the same one I passed 4 times looking around) and got irritated over my hacking)

It's funny, most of the issues with the game are the same issues that the original had. Lack of cutting edge graphics? Check. Average voice acting? Check. Boss fights that suddenly demand that you use shooter skills? Check. So for me these aren't a major deal breaker. I just hope you can do some super unscripted things like you could in DX1.

For instance, in DX1 you could use LAMs to mine the entire plane. When you'll be talking on the plane and hear "we have to go before UNACO arrives..", BAMM!, well there

That has to be the stupidest justification I've ever heard. How will it have been spoiled? Because you can't stop yourself from reading spoilers? You can wait as long as you like and not have it spoiled.

I actually own the game but I'm not going to play it this week, probably not next week, maybe not next month. I have too much on my plate both actual stuff I need to do and just other games I'm playing and want to finish before I start a new one. I don't at all worry it'll be "spoiled". I am not going to go

While I don't think there's anything morally wrong with paying for the game and getting the download from an unauthorized source just to get it earlier, you don't need to do that to avoid spoilers. Just refrain from reading threads and reviews about the game. Do something else, like read about Libya or play some other game that's in your backlog of games to play.

1: discovered theres a new deus ex on slashdot2: seen the trailer3: OMG there is KILLING you are not meant to do that in DEUS EX. JCD would never do!4: Oh god, he hurts people!5: I have to be better, gotta do that without that ugly shooting!6: *clicketyclick*

I only learned about this last week from a TV ad. My first thought was "that is not Deux Ex, that's just a stupid shooter where they make the graphics cool so the kids buy it."

Plus it's Steam based it seems. Even if you have DVD you must use Steam. Therefore I will not buy it. Even if it does turn out it really is like Deus Ex, I refuse to support DRM so that I can rent a game instead of owning it. Since they're all going Steam, I guess this is the end of new computer games for me.

Given the number of games that have (and have had) activation servers, I suspect you haven't been playing PC games for awhile.

Having just online activation is far worse than having a whole platform, like Steam or Impulse. If the publisher/developer goes under or even just decides to shut the servers off, better hope they're nice enough to patch out activation. Otherwise, you're boned. At least with Steam you have a reasonable certainty that it'll be around in a few years.

But Steam will not be nice enough to patch out activation if they drop the servers. Many fans claim this will happen but the reality is that this is impractical. Companies don't just go out of business and then open the doors and let anyone walk on in. They have creditors who want a piece of the pie. If they go out of business devs won't have an opportunity to say "give me an hour to upload the global unlock switch" because the machines will be shut off an they'll be walked out the door; if they manage

Achievements are silly. Remember when you used to play Thief in ghost mode and you knew if you accomplished it without having the computer tell you or broadcasting it to the internet like it was a competition?

I hope not. They would ruin it. Leave an old game in peace instead of ramping it up with action, sticking it on a console, adding online modes, clouds, DRM, steam, kiddies, etc. That would be about as stupid as making a remake of Conan or Blade Runner.

... that said, if you can get the first Deus Ex game (it's sold on Steam, not sure where else), by all means do so. It's a masterpiece - one of those games like X-COM or Fallout that is truly a work of art.

This isn't a troll. I want to buy this but wondering if anyone has tested this under wine, appdb reports garbage but they were pre-release versions. Payday on Thursday so hopefully appdb updated with at least a silver before then:)

No it's accurate:
"Deus Ex has appeared in a number of "Greatest Games of All Time" lists and Hall of Fame features, placing in the top thirty for most, and in the top ten for many."
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deus_Ex#Awards_and_Greatest_games_lists)